This year marks 20 years since the first United Nations Financing for Development (FfD) Conference was held in Monterrey, Mexico. It was the first UN summit-level meeting and a landmark international consensus to address key financial and related issues pertaining to global development, which took place just as the world was reeling from economic recession. Since then, two other conferences took place throughout these years and the date for the next one is not yet fixed.
As a member of the CS for FfD Group, the Global Alliance for Tax Justice (GATJ) joins other civil society organisations to call for the 4th UN Financing for Development Conference to take place in 2024. Such an international conference on FfD has never been more urgent, given the financing needs in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic and climate emergency. Future summits including the UN Social Summit in 2025 will only succeed if urgent reforms of the global financial system are advanced.
A new FfD conference should ensure the democratisation of global economic governance, recognising the right of every country to be at the decision-making table. Such multilateral reforms include an intergovernmental agreement on UN convention on tax, to pave the way for all countries to participate on an equal footing, which is currently not a reality with the global tax rules being made in the OECD without a level playing field between rich and developing countries, and without the participation of more than one third of the countries in the world. Growing inequalities within and between countries, and the devastating impact of the multiple crises in the world make this more urgent than ever.
Bold reforms in our tax and financial system are needed to realign it with the imperatives of human rights, placing people and the planet at its centre. The UN should be central to the development of global policy guidelines and safeguards to build coherence and advance the goals in all the FfD outcome documents and action areas, ensuring there is no retrogression on past commitments.
It is time for UN Member States to convene the 4th FfD conference in 2024 to agree a new consensus on a democratised global economic and financial governance that works for people and the planet!
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